Special Feature: Samurai Games Are Back, Baby

There were several trends expected to be on full display with new games shown at E3 2018, and publishers by and large delivered on them. For instance, some battle royale games were announced, and we witnessed a continuation of last year’s trend involving post-apocalyptic survival games. But an unexpected one reemerged: Samurai games.

The setting, mostly used for action games, was especially popular in the PS2 days. Several franchises started on the system, including the Onimusha series, Genji: Dawn of the Samurai, and the Way of the Samurai series. But several Japanese companies shifted their focus towards appealing to the worldwide audience during the last console generation, and didn’t feel samurai games were that popular outside Japan. Of the three aforementioned franchises, the Onimusha series started and ended on PS2 outside a browser/mobile spinoff, Genji was put to rest after the clearly-rushed second game (mainly known as that “Giant Enemy Crab” game) released at the PS3’s launch, and the Way of the Samurai series ended with the fourth game seven years ago.

Koei Tecmo’s Samurai Warriors franchise has survived, and they established the Monster Hunter-like Toukiden series, but there have been few examples outside them since the PS2 era. The other more niche examples have stayed in Japan, like Spike Chunsoft’s Ukiyo titles from Danganronpa team members, and Sega’s historical Yakuza games. Now, signs suggest they’re getting popular again worldwide.

Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice was announced during Microsoft’s E3 conference, a new samurai action title from FromSoftware due to be published by Activision. This is one of the three big titles coming from the developer in the near future, and is the title teased at The Game Awards last December. Hidetaka Miyazaki, who directed the previous Souls games besides Dark Souls II, will have the same role here. (He’s also CEO of the company, so he’s busy these days.)

The game will be set in a reimagined Sengoku period in Japan’s late 16th century, and will star a samurai thought to be left for dead after his arm was severed. Instead, his arm was replaced with a prosthetic one by a busshi (a Japanese sculptor) named “Sekiro.” Now, the samurai has vowed revenge against the one who almost killed him and kidnapped his master, armed with a sword and prosthetic arm that offensive and defensive tools can be attached to.

FromSoftware’s developers have spent time explaining how this isn’t a new take on the Souls series since the reveal, nor is it an action RPG at all. It’s a straight-up single-player action-adventure game with no stats or classes, nor are there other weapons or equipment to obtain. The game will have a heavy focus on attacking when an enemy’s guard is down or broken, and parrying when an enemy attacks. While this sounds somewhat like the Souls games and Bloodborne, it also sounds reminiscent of Ninja Gaiden. The combination of a fighter armed only with a sword and an irregular arm who also has the option of light stealth to dispatch enemies makes this sound like a good version of Ninja Gaiden 3.

Sekiro will release sometime early next year, for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. In the meantime, hopefully they’ll let us see the gameplay demo shown to the press behind closed doors soon. Like, real soon.

Ghost of Tsushima is also coming, a title previously announced at Sony’s Paris Games Show conference last year, but received its first demo at this year’s E3. The game will take place in the late 13th century, during the first Mongol invasion of Japan, and star supposed last samurai Jin Sakai. Jin will have to master a new style of fighting to take on the Mongols and liberate Japan, which sounds like a tall order. But he’ll have help along the way, as seen in the demo, though that only involved a side quest.

Tsushima is being developed by Sucker Punch, who previously handled the Infamous urban superhero games, so this is a big departure. It’s also a departure for a western development team, since they tend to leave samurai epics for Japanese teams to handle, but they seem to be doing all their homework — literally, I mean. The game’s development staff all attended a Japanese 101 class to learn as much as they could about the historical Japan setting, so it sounds like it’s in good hands. This can also be seen in how beautiful it looks in motion, in a demo that was running on an actual PS4 Pro.

Its gameplay systems look reminiscent of the Batman: Arkham games, though its sword battles require a little more skill, and the stealth sections appear less automatic. Jin will also have accessories in his arsenal for stealth and offensive purposes, though the only one displayed in the demo is a grappling hook. Again, mission shown in the demo was a side quest, but it’s meant to show how much work the team is putting into even the comparatively unimportant aspects of the game. It sounds like the final product will be worth the wait, and hopefully they deliver on its promise.

Unfortunately, it could take a while for us to determine its quality, as Sony left E3 without providing so much as a timeframe. We should have a better idea of its release time later in the year, after its demoed again during at least one of the three remaining conferences Sony has planned (that’s Tokyo Game Show, Paris Games Show, and PlayStation Experience).

You could say the original Nioh predated this reemergence of historical Japanese settings when it released early last year. It was originally announced before the PS3 launched, and before Koei merged with Tecmo. The project was put on hold, but was picked up by Team Ninja after the merger, which reimagined it as a title that took inspiration from the Souls games and Onimusha. It was well received, so it’s no surprise that a sequel is coming, though it was announced sooner than many expected.

Nioh 2 hasn’t been shown yet, but given its potential status as a quick sequel, it will inherit many features from the first game. Early details were shared by director Fumihiko Yasuda and Team Ninja creative director Tom Lee during a PlayStation E3 livestream, who explained how one of the biggest changes will involve the protagonist. Instead of playing as William from the first game, players will create their own yokai-possessed character, complete with a choice of gender and race. They also confirmed they’ll release demos again to gauge feedback before the  release, as they did for the first game.

Nioh 2 is only planned for a PS4 release, though it could hit Steam afterward like the first game. There’s no release timeframe for this one either, but hopefully it will be shown soon, perhaps at TGS.

Meanwhile, Capcom hasn’t confirmed a return of PS2 king Onimusha, but something could happen soon. “Onimusha” trademarks were discovered to have been registered in several countries two months ago, which could point towards a new title or a remaster collection. Between those two, it would likely be the former, given how remastering the earlier games would require redoing some backgrounds in the first two games and relicensing the likenesses of the actors involved. It could also point towards nothing special, but let’s keep a little hope alive.

Sega also made two samurai Yakuza spinoffs in Kenzan! and Ishin!, last-generation and cross-generation titles, respectively. There’s likely no chance that either title will be released outside Japan at this point, but there’s a moderate chance that another samurai title could be made in the future, which could be localized.

I personally missed these kinds of games after the PS2 era, and had the feeling companies that decided to chase the ostensibly larger western dollars with grittier games took the wrong approach. The audience playing video games around the world likes historical Japanese settings more than expected. Hopefully this is the beginning of a longer string of them, though not to the point that the audience tires of them.